


Accidental Knife Acquisition

by coveredvoid



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Hunk (Voltron) Has Anxiety, Hunk (Voltron)-centric, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Misunderstandings, POV Hunk (Voltron), a lot of misunderstandings, but he doesnt make an appearance that much, its an entire work about hunk thinking mostly about keith, kind of?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-20 14:35:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14896391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coveredvoid/pseuds/coveredvoid
Summary: Rewrite!After a training accident, Hunk’s guilt leads him to try and make it up to Keith. How? By taking his most prized possession and cleaning it of course! Only things don’t always go according to plan and Hunk realizes this when the knife he took goes missing. Now he has to find it before Keith realizes what he did.Only that’s easier said than done.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Glad to get this chapter when I said I would! To any new readers, this is a rewrite of a work with the same name. I wasn't proud of how that came out so I fixed it up. The first three chapters will be similar to the old one but there will be a lot more detail and certain things have been fixed.

The next day the paladins found themselves in the training room. With Shiro leading this one Hunk didn’t quite fear for his life, but that didn’t mean he was going easy on them. The black paladin had paired them off into teams of two. According to him, it was just as important for them to strengthen their bonds one on one as it was for them to bond as a team.

As such, Hunk was paired with Keith who he admittedly had the worst bond with. Not that he minded working with Keith or anything! It was just that he didn’t quite know how to work with him just yet. Which was probably why they needed the practice. Keith was a close range fighter and that definitely showed as they were training. He was essentially in the training bots face leaving Hunk, who was a long ranged fighter, panicking over where to shoot.

“Keith, back up! You’re working as a team!” Called Shiro and it seemed to do the trick. Keith had moved away from the bot and his fighting even changed to account for the added distance. Sighing in relief that he could actually do things now, Hunk began to shoot at it, pausing between shots to allow Keith to lash out.

It was working for awhile too! Well, until Hunk hesitated on a shot. Keith apparently took this as a sign to move. Only Hunk’s hesitation didn’t last long enough for that and he accidentally shot. His eyes widened in horror as he hit Keith in the back.

Fortunately, the bayards had a setting that lowered their intensity for training, part of the reason the bots were so much harder to beat than the galran bots. Not to mention the armor they wore was pretty good, even the undersuit. However, the blow was still enough to stun Keith enough that he stumbled and the bot hit him with its staff at the same time. The red paladin went flying into the wall and Hunk winced as he heard the sharp crack of his head against the wall. They should have been wearing their helmets, oh god.

“End training sequence!” He called hurriedly when the bot tried to advance towards him. He had bigger things to worry about. “Please don’t be dead, please don’t be dead,” he said, rushing to Keith’s side.

“Hunk, what happened?” asked Shiro as he began checking Keith over.

“It was an accident! I messed up a shot and hit him and the bot slammed him into the wall and now he’s not moving and- Shiro is he dead? Did I accidentally kill him?” Hunk could feel tears forming and he didn’t bother trying to blink them back.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and remembered to breathe. The hand was attached to Lance who, along with Pidge, had joined them.

“Dude, calm down,” began Lance. “It was an accident and could have happened to anyone. It wasn’t your fault.”

“Lance is right,” added Shiro, “It was-” Whatever Shiro was about to say was cut off when Keith groaned. They all looked at the red paladin with bated breaths as he stirred.

“What- what happened?” He asked. Keith moved to sit up and the action only seemed to cause him pain and he winced. “My head…”

“Training accident,” said Shiro simply. “We need to get you to the medbay. Can you walk?” Hunk wasn’t sure if that was the best idea, but it seemed that no amount of head pain would stop Keith. Using Shiro as an anchor, he got to his feet and stumbled slightly.

All five of them made it to the medbay where they called Coran down on the intercom. As he made his way down, they set Keith on one of the cots. Pidge grabbed one of the scanners and activated it. Hunk wasn’t quite sure when she learned the tech in here, but with how curious she was and how late she stayed up he wasn’t about to question it.

“What does it say?” Lance asked, trying to look over Pidge’s shoulder to read the scan.

“I don’t know, I can’t read Altean,” she said, narrowing her eyes at the screen.

Coran made his appearance just then and grabbed the scanner. “Not to worry Number Five! Now, what do we have here…” He hummed as he read through the results. Hunk fiddled with his hands while he waited, his anxiety growing by the second. Shiro was trying to keep Keith awake while all this was happening.

“Well then! Looks like Number Four took a nasty hit to the head, nothing some rest can’t fix,” he said cheerfully, which in Hunk’s opinion was not fitting for the situation at all.

“Can’t we just throw him in a healing pod?” asked Lance.

“No can do. The castle is busy trying to get rid of the remains of the effects of Sendak’s crystal and it would be too much of a risk putting him in there now.” Hunk supposed that made sense. Who knew what the pod would do to Keith now. Maybe he would get creepily possessed like Alfor’s A.I had been. Hunk might not be close to Keith but he was not going to fight him, possessed or not.

“Anyhow, nothing you lot can do here now. I’ll keep an eye on him for the night and alert you if anything goes wrong.”

“Thanks, Coran,” said Shiro, looking a lot less stressed than he had ten minutes ago. “I think I’ll stay a little longer if that’s okay.”

“Well if he’s fine then no reason for me to stay,” said Lance casually. “I’m going to go take a shower.” The blue paladin shot them some finger guns before taking off. Pidge was soon to follow, claiming she was working on a prototype for Rover 2.0. She asked Hunk if he wanted to help but he refused, the guilt churning in his stomach was distracting him too much.

 

Coran, Shiro, and Hunk stayed there for awhile. Keith had long since fallen asleep (once Coran deemed it okay). Hunk kept wringing out his fingers, a familiar nervous habit. Shiro apparently noticed and set his hand over the yellow paladin’s, halting his movements.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. Accidents happen.” Hunk didn’t know how Shiro was so good at this, but he felt himself calming down.

“I just… feel so bad y’know? I-I get it was an accident but Keith is still hurt because of it.” He looked down at his hands. “I want to make it up to him.” Shiro moved his hand to Hunk’s shoulder and gave him a reassuring smile.

“You will when he wakes up. I’m sure of it.” Hunk nodded, his anxiety was much more manageable now.

They sat in silence for a while longer until Shiro decided to take his leave. He didn’t give a reason why but Hunk suspected he was going to check on the others. He tended to do that.

After about ten minutes (vargas? dobashes? He had no idea what the altean alternative was) Coran said, “It looks like it’s time to prepare for dinner. Number Four should be fine enough for me to go whip something up real quick!” Normally, Hunk would protest but he just didn’t have it in him. “Can you possibly take his things to his room? When he wakes up I don’t want him to worry about such trivial things.”

Shiro had taken off Keith’s armor only leaving him in the undersuit. His bayard and knife also needed to be taken back and Hunk didn’t mind. He nodded as Coran set off to prepare what was bound to be a disgusting dinner.

 

On his way to Keith’s room, Hunk couldn’t help but wonder how he was going to make it up to the red paladin. He usually cooked a person’s favorite food when he wanted to do something for them (the number of garlic knots he made for Lance was insane) but he didn’t know what Keith’s favorite was. The guy would eat anything if his lack of complaint from Coran’s food was any indication.

Perhaps he could build something? As good as a cook as he was, he was a better engineer. Keith had a bike at the shack maybe- no. Hunk shook his head at the thought. That would take months and by the time he was done Keith probably wouldn’t even remember the training incident. He needed something fast.

Too bad he had no idea what Keith liked. Hunk sighed as he reached the room and opened up the door. He set the armor and weapons on the ledge next to the door before dragging his hands over his face. This was harder than he thought.

Realizing he was in Keith’s room he looked up hoping to find anything to allude to Keith’s interests. Only… it was empty. Like seriously, did Keith even live here? If not for the slight dip in the pillow he would have doubted the red paladin slept in his room.

Now, Hunk knew they hadn’t been in space that long but in that time he had seen what could happen to the rooms. Pidge’s was, essentially, a trash can. He tried telling her to clean up and she yelled that he wasn’t her mom which led to her getting upset about her family and- well it was basically a mess that took quite a few hugs to fix. (Hunk hadn’t brought up her messy room since but still feared that she would get lost in there if it got any worse.)

Lance’s room had pictures of his family that he had in his wallet taped to the wall. Not to mention the extra blankets he found and the jars of food goo that Hunk regretted asking about.

Even Hunk’s room looked lived in! His moms were very strict that he kept his room clean and he wasn’t about to fall out of that habit now that they were in space, but even then he had a few crystals from the Balmera as well as a few notebooks with stray recipes or plans for a build he thought of at 3 am.

This was just sad, although he wasn’t surprised. Groaning, he sat on the bed wanting to figure out how to make it up to Keith before he went to dinner. His mind went back to the conversation the day before, how the red paladin seemed offended at the thought of his knife being used for food.

The knife! That was important to Keith, right? Maybe if he cleaned it that would do the trick! He went over to the ledge he had put the stuff on and grabbed it. It was actually pretty cool, he couldn’t tell what material it was made of but it was definitely reflective and, after pricking his finger on accident, very sharp. Keith took well care of it if the shine was any indication, but judging by the messy and frayed bandages, it could use an upgrade.

With a plan set, Hunk left the room, knife in hand.


	2. Chapter 2

Hunk only had time to drop the knife off in his own room before making his way to dinner. Just as expected it was disgusting. It looked vaguely like a blue quiche topped with what was probably an animal’s stomach. Since he was the last to arrive, he got to see how disgusted everyone looked. Lance was gagging as he poked it with a fork, Pidge was ignoring it for her laptop, and Shiro was eating it with intense concentration on his face.

Fortunately, Coran wasn’t there since he had to check on Keith. Hunk wasted no time getting the disgusting food from them and leading them to the kitchen. He prided himself on being a good friend and set up bowls of food goo. The goo wasn’t the best, but it beat blue alien quiche any day in Hunk’s humble opinion.

 

The next day he woke up to the alarm. Not his alarm but the castle’s alarm. Unlike the drill before, this time he jumped out of bed (not rolled, character development).

He still showed up to the bridge in his pajamas. To be fair it took awhile to change into the armor and Allura would kill them for wasting time. She’d also kill them for showing up in pajamas but at least this way he was comfortable.

Only she didn’t look murderous, when they showed up she was smiling. Shiro was next to her, a hand on his forehead.

“Guess who feels better,” he said with a pained smile.

“I thought another alarm drill would help you all wake up for a day of training.” Now, Hunk admired Allura a lot but that did not mean he wanted to wake up to the castle’s alarm.

“Can we leave the drills for actual emergencies?” complained Pidge, looking like she had just woken up. “If you keep this up it’ll be like the boy who cried wolf.” The reference seemed to confuse Allura who furrowed her eyebrows. Pidge noticed this and sighed before explaining, “An old book on Earth, a boy kept falsely reporting a wolf and when there actually was a wolf no one believed him.”

“I would hope that you would all believe me if there was a real alarm,” replied Allura, completely missing the point. Hunk couldn’t blame her when she was an alien and Pidge seemed to think the same as she just sighed.

“Why don’t we head to breakfast? It’s too late to go back to bed now,” said Shiro. Everyone seemed to be in agreement and they made their way to the dining room.

 

Everyone was already settled and eating by the time Coran joined them.

“H-how’s Keith?” Hunk asked, feeling the guilt slowly coming back.

“Well, he was doing just fine during the night! But the alarm didn’t do him any favors. I’ll be keeping him in the med bay for a bit longer.”

“Perhaps… not the best time to run a drill,” said Allura sheepishly, unable to help an embarrassed blush.

“I’ll get him some breakfast,” said Shiro, grabbing another bowl of goo.

The rest of breakfast passed with small conversations. Allura, Coran, and Pidge had left leaving only Hunk and Lance, who was retelling a story about his nephew. They made their way to the kitchen and Hunk set down the dishes.

“So,” he said, cutting off Lance’s story. “It’s your turn to wash the dishes.” The blue paladin sputtered and Hunk grabbed his arm before he could sneak out, as he had done in the past. “Not so fast! You’ve gotten out of washing dishes twice already.”

Lance groaned but didn’t argue. Perhaps if there were more dishes, Hunk would have helped. However, there had been a few times he helped only to end up doing all the work as Lance had too much practice pawning off chores to his siblings.

Shiro entered the kitchen holding two more dishes just as Lance was finishing up and the two younger paladins were quick to greet him.

“How’s Keith doing?” Hunk asked, still concerned about the red paladin’s status.

“He’s doing well, not as good as he would be if the alarm hadn’t happened, but well enough,” said Shiro as he set down the dishes. “I’m going to try and get him to come to dinner later.” If Keith would be going to dinner, Hunk wanted to return his knife by then. Meaning he should get started on it now.

“I just remembered I had to do something,” he said, already heading towards the door.

“What is it?” asked Lance casually. Despite it being a logical question, Hunk found himself tensing up as if he had been caught.

“Uh… I needed to ask Coran about something,” he said, which wasn’t exactly a lie. Still, he was acting weird enough that Lance was narrowing his eyes and Shiro had raised his eyebrow.

“Ask him what?”

“Medical… things…” Hunk cringed at his poor excuse. He usually wasn’t this bad at lying but that was when he had rehearsed the lie fifty times in his head. This was all improvised and the yellow paladin could tell the other two didn’t buy it for a second. Thankfully, however, they were both nice enough to let it slide enough for him to slip away.

If Hunk was in their position he would have definitely pushed some more. He was naturally curious, okay? Only, if Lance pushed he would have spilled everything and his best friend knew that. He also knew Hunk would end up telling him later anyway. Which the yellow paladin was already planning to do after he returned the knife.

 

It took Hunk awhile to find Coran which was rather embarrassing since the altean was in the medbay the entire time. In his defense though, that was the last place he wanted to check since he wasn’t ready to face Keith yet. Surprisingly the red paladin wasn’t even there.

Coran seemed to notice his confusion. “Number Four went to his room.” Hunk relaxed for a moment before remembering what he wanted to ask.

“Actually I wanted to ask for a few things.” This grabbed Coran’s attention and he looked up.

“What I can get you, my boy?”

“Bandages?” It wasn’t the only thing he needed but, considering the fact that they were in the medbay, it seemed to be the quickest. It didn’t take long for Coran to find a roll in one of the cabinets.

“Anything else?” asked the altean, not even bothering to ask why. Which Hunk had prepared an excuse this time so the fact that he didn’t even need it meant he wasted the mental energy rehearsing.

“Yeah, I need some sort of way to polish a knife? I mean the knives in the kitchen. They could really use it after ten thousand years.” This time Hunk had to use the excuse since he almost slipped up. Coran didn’t even seem to notice, however, and only led him out of the med bay.

They went down quite a few halls before Coran stopped in front of what looked like a storage closet. The fact that he knew where everything was in such a huge castle never ceased to amaze Hunk.

Coran soon reemerged with a cloth in hand. It reminded Hunk of a washcloth only it looked softer. It was dark blue with silver specks woven into it.

“Feel free to ask me if you need anything else, Number Two,” said Coran cheerfully before padding off. With bandages and cloth in hand, Hunk did the same and headed towards his room to finally clean the knife.

 

He barely had enough time to set down his things before Allura’s voice came on over the intercom telling them (besides Keith who was still recovering) to go to the training deck. Right, the princess wasn’t the type to give them a day off unless they all had concussions. Making a plan to clean the knife after training, he heads off to the training deck.

 

Hunk didn’t have a chance to clean the knife as planned since after training Pidge wanted his help on Rover 2.0. He thought about refusing but it was hard to say no when she had gotten so upset over Rover 1.0. Not to mention it was fun working with her. He was glad she was more open then at the garrison because he loved to hear her ideas. Pidge was truly a super genius.

Sitting in her lab working on refining a design for their project, his mind strayed to the knife. At this rate, he wouldn’t have enough time to get it done before dinner. Maybe Keith’s concussion would scramble his head enough that he wouldn’t notice? Was that awful to hope for? Yeah, it was a little awful to hope for someone’s concussion to be bad, no matter the reason.

Hunk set aside the notebook he was working in and set his head in his hands. He could just feel the headache forming. This apparently seemed to catch Pidge’s attention as she spoke up.

“Hit a problem?” she asked, probably referring to the design. Hunk decided to roll with it.

“Just a bit. I’m trying to figure out a way to power it,” he reported, which wasn’t a lie. Altean tech was still new to him so he didn’t know what method would be the most effective, but he had drawn out ideas for each way.

Pidge gave her input and they continued to work on the project. Hunk didn’t even realize how much time had passed until Shiro stopped by to tell them dinner was ready.

 

Keith was at dinner as expected and Hunk was slightly taken aback by how… well bad he looked. His hair was a mess as if he had run his fingers through it a lot, and he looked exhausted. He had his head propped up on his hand and he was glaring at his food as if it had greatly offended him. Maybe he should have been resting in his room more? Hunk was sure no one would mind bringing him food again.

Hunk wasn’t going to say anything about his appearance but Lance sure was. The blue paladin was sitting next to Keith and kept making comments.

“Sheesh man, it’s like you woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Did someone spit in your food goo?” said Lance as he ate his own food.

Now, Hunk knew Lance and he knew that his friend was very caring. However, any caring nature he had was immediately thrown out the window when it came to Keith and his concerned remarks turned into what sounded like jabs. The yellow paladin could tell this wasn’t going to end well when Keith’s grip on his spork tightened.

“I’m not in the mood, Lance,” he said through gritted teeth. Shiro took notice of the situation then and tried to step in before anything happened.

“Lance, leave him alone.”

“Oh come on!” Exclaimed Lance, putting up his hands. “He looks terrible he should go back-” Whatever Lance was going to say was cut off by the sharp screech of Keith’s chair as he stood up and walked out. Well, stormed out more accurately. Hunk couldn’t help his wince.

“Is he alright?” asked Allura after a tense silence. Shiro sighed.

“Give him time to cool off.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let allura be a teenager 2k18  
> anyways, im hoping to have this done before season 6, chapter 3 is already written and chapter 4 is started  
> Im not sure if it'll be 5 chapters or 6, it depends on if i condense it for one big chapter which... i might just do  
> also i want to thank everyone that read the earlier version and is back for this one, chapter 3 will have a new scene that wasnt in the previous version so...


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another update! I'm on a roll.
> 
> So finishing this before the new season is definitely a thing I can do because god knows im going to be too excited afterwards to do any writing. I saw the spoilers and lets just say I'm very... excited for episode 2...

When Hunk returned to his room shortly after dinner, he was glad to finally have the chance to clean the knife. Not that he really wanted to return it when Keith was in such a bad mood, but he knew from past experiences not to put things off. He moved to sit on his bed with the cloth, bandages, and knife in hand. His mind strayed to the events at dinner while he was using the cloth to clean the blade.

Keith was pretty hot-headed but not like that. Most of the time he would make a few jabs at Lance in response or just roll his eyes. This was the first time Hunk had heard him outright tell Lance he wasn’t in the mood. Before, the yellow paladin was sure Keith was never in the mood so for him to actually specify that he wasn’t up for it was… well odd. It made him wonder if, in the past, Keith had actually been okay with being insulted?

It was too complicated to think about and with how closed off Keith was he would never be told enough to find out. Hunk returned his attention to the knife that he had been absentmindedly polishing while he was deep in thought. What was already pretty shiny before seemed to sparkle and Hunk wondered again what type of metal this was. Steel was his first guess but no steel he had come across was this bright or reflective.

He reigned in his curiosity- wondering would only give him more questions- and began to unwrap the dirty bandages. His eyes widened at the sigil that was revealed. Why was that being covered up? His curiosity returned immediately and Hunk didn’t bother trying to pull it back. This was almost as satisfying as reading Pidge’s diary. (Okay so maybe Hunk had an issue with his friends’ privacy but everyone had their flaws and being nosy was his.)

The stone he uncovered was indigo and Hunk rubbed his thumb against it. After closer inspection, he noticed that the sigil on it was glowing. That made the knife even more mysterious and beautiful. Why would Keith even think about covering this up with ratty bandages? A part of Hunk was tempted to just leave it uncovered because of how cool it looked but he decided against it. If it was covered there was probably a reason. Maybe it was a family symbol Keith was ashamed of?

Hunk knew the red paladin was an orphan, it was all people at the Garrison could talk about. Was this from his birth family? Oh god, did Hunk take the last thing Keith had from his birth family? He thought it was just an ordinary knife, not some ancient heirloom! Face pale, the yellow paladin hurried to rewrap it with the new bandages. If this was that important he would have to return it as soon as possible.

Hunk stood up, intent on doing just that when the lights dimmed indicating that it was time for sleep. They weren’t forced to follow that schedule, Pidge was a prime example of that with quite a few late nights, but he felt anxious returning the knife at night. What if Keith was trying to sleep when Hunk bothered him and he lashed out? With how tired the red paladin was at dinner, he was not willing to risk it.

Instead, Hunk set the newly cleaned knife on the ledge next to the door. He wasn’t too fond about leaving it out in the open, but he had nowhere else to place it besides his bed and he wasn’t the type of person that slept with a knife- especially an unsheathed knife- under his pillow.

 

Hunk woke up slowly and couldn’t help but lay in bed for a few extra minutes. After being woken up so abruptly the day before, he was reveling in the silence. Eventually, he did have to get up to take a shower and get dressed, but he took his time.

It was only when he was in the shower that he remembered the knife. Hunk was quick to finish up after making that realization. If he was lucky he would be able to return it to Keith before breakfast and finally have that weight off his shoulders.

Only, when he returned to his room, he couldn’t find it. Eyes widening, Hunk searched the ledge he set it on, moving the occasional Balmeran crystal to check if it just got hidden in the mess. He swore he put it there! The yellow paladin continued to search, rearranging the crystals over and over again to see if he missed it.

When he finally realized that it wasn’t on the ledge and he was just wasting his time, he turned to the rest of his room. Hunk checked the floor, under his bed, and even his mattress to see if it just got misplaced. With each place he checked turning out to be a dud, he felt his anxiety rising.

Hunk began to squeeze at his hands without even realizing it. All he was focused on was the fact that he lost Keith’s knife. Not just that, but this might have been a very important heirloom. It wasn’t like Hunk could just find a replacement, seeing as how they were in space and this knife was probably one of a kind.

As his anxiety rose, his breathing sped up and he sat on his bed to get it under control. His old therapist’s words came to mind, breathe in for four seconds, hold for seven seconds, exhale for eight seconds. He repeated the steps until he was able to think again.

The castle was big, but it had to be somewhere. He would have to look and hope Keith doesn’t find out.

 

He couldn’t stop fidgeting at breakfast but at least Keith wasn’t there to make him even more anxious. Lance had noticed but after asking about it a few times with only short answers in response, he let it go. Normally Hunk would spill everything to his best friend but not this. If word got back to Keith… god, he didn’t even want to think about it.

Vaguely, he registered Shiro leaving with a bowl for Keith and Lance complaining about favoritism.

“I mean really! When I miss breakfast I get dragged out of bed, not delivery.”

“To be fair, you always miss breakfast. Keith doesn’t,” replied Pidge with her mouth full of goo.

“Pidge, please, I need you on my side here,” said Lance as he crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “And he missed breakfast yesterday.”

“He had a concussion.” The reminder seemed to quiet Lance for the most part, but Hunk could hear him grumble about it more under his breath.

Shiro didn’t take too long to reappear, holding a full bowl of goo. “He wasn’t in his room,” the black paladin reported with a frown. This did nothing to help Hunk’s anxiety.

“Maybe he’s in the training deck?” he suggested shakily. Keith liked to train, right? That was a valid guess. Apparently not since Shiro shook his head.

“We locked it from him until he recovers, just in case he tried.”

“He’s probably brooding somewhere, he’ll show up,” said Pidge looking unconcerned. She was right, brooding was a thing Keith did and Hunk tried to relax with that reminder. Shiro still looked worried, however, and hesitated before sitting down.

 

It wasn’t until much later that he ran into Keith in the kitchen. Hunk had been looking for the knife since breakfast with no results when he decided to check the most obvious place, the knife drawer. Only, it seemed Keith had reached it before he had and was already looking. Hunk’s face went pale at the sight, he was looking for the knife.

Keith seemed to notice him and froze, looking as if he had been caught with a hand in the cookie jar. Or, knife drawer to be more accurate.

“Uhhh, hi?” said Hunk, trying to relieve some of the awkward tension. “You missed breakfast.” Keith slammed the drawer and backed away from it as if it had burned him. He opened and closed his mouth a few times before awkwardly responding.

“I was just um… looking for something. I- I lost track of time.” Oh man and that broke Hunk’s heart. Keith missed breakfast because he was looking for his knife, the knife Hunk lost. How awful was he?

“What were you looking for?” asked Hunk, smiling as if he didn’t know. Only, he did know and the guilt was weighing him down.

“Nothing important,” said Keith. Which the yellow paladin saw as a complete lie. Obviously, it was important! He wouldn’t have missed breakfast if it wasn’t!

Hunk doesn’t mention this though, wanting to redirect the conversation and get rid of the awkwardness. “I can get you a bowl of food goo if you want? Unless you already ate but-”

“No I- I didn’t get the chance. Some goo would be… nice?” Keith seemed to be looking anywhere but at Hunk and it was… well awkward was the only word for it. Maybe they could make social skills part of their training. Not even just for Keith (although he needed them the most) a few of the others could benefit from it in different ways.

Hunk set up a bowl for Keith and the red paladin took it. He ate while sitting on the counter which, if it were anyone else, Hunk would have said something. However, he couldn’t bring himself to comment on it though, not when he was the terrible person that lost Keith’s knife in the first place.

They didn’t talk as Keith ate and Hunk didn’t know whether or not he should be grateful for it. Sure, the conversation was awkward but the silence was even more so. If it wasn’t for the guilt keeping him there, Hunk would have left by now.

When Keith was finished he spoke up. “Thank you,” he said, staring down at the now empty bowl before looking up at the yellow paladin. “Um, you didn’t have to stay.” Hunk tensed up. So he should have left instead of watching Keith eat like a creep. Noted.

“It’s uh, no problem?” He said as Keith cleaned the bowl. When he was done, the red paladin looked over as if he was going to say something else but eventually just left instead.

When he was out of sight, Hunk groaned and set his head on the counter. What started as him trying to do something nice, turned into a mess. He needed to find the knife.


	4. Chapter 4

The rest of Hunk’s day was spent looking for the knife with minimal success. Occasionally, he would cross paths with Keith (who was also looking) and leave the room as quickly as possible. He was sure the red paladin noticed his sudden departure a few times but he never brought it up.

 

Lance noticed his weird behavior and made sure to confront him the next day after he had searched through what felt like the fiftieth supply closet.

“Okay man, I’ve let it slide but you have got to tell me what’s up. I’m worried about you,” he said, setting his hand on Hunk’s shoulder. The yellow paladin couldn’t hold it back anymore and began to cry.

“I messed up real bad dude! You know how I accidentally caused Keith’s concussion? Yes, I know it wasn’t entirely my fault but it still feels like it- no, let me finish,” he stated as he noticed Lance about to interrupt. If he stopped now he would be crying too much to finish the story. “So I thought I could make it up to him only I don’t know what he likes and usually I’d make him something he likes to eat but I don’t know what he likes and also we’re in space so that really limits the options so instead I thought I could clean the knife he always carries around because hey, people like their things cleaned for them. Only I can’t find the knife and now he’s looking and- oh did I mention it was an heirloom? Because it’s an heirloom, Lance, making it so much more important and-”

“Hey hey, calm down, you have to breathe man. Remember those exercises? In four, hold seven, out eight? Do the exercises. We’ll figure this out but you have to breathe first.” With Lance’s help, Hunk slowly calmed down from his panic and was able to think more clearly. That was… not the first panic attack Lance had helped him with and at this rate, it wasn’t going to be the last.

“Okay, okay.” He rubbed his face to get his thoughts back in order.

“Where did you last see it?”

“It was in my room, next to the Balmeran crystals. But when I woke up it was gone.” Lance hummed and rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

“Did you move it?”

“If I did I wouldn’t be freaking out!”

“Okay, okay,” Lance said defensively. “Lucky for you, your best friend, Lancey Lance, got us the day off.” Hunk blinked at him.

“How did you manage that?”

“Some baloney about needing to train with the entire team, Allura ate it right up.” The way he said it made Lance think he was lying but he wasn’t about to point it out. “So anyways that just means we have the entire day to look.”

After some debate, they decided to check with Pidge first. She was pretty curious, if she had come across the knife and noticed how odd it was she might have taken it to do some research.

   

“Why would I have his knife?” asked Pidge as soon as they confronted her about it in her room.

“Uh… why wouldn’t you?” replied Hunk. Not his… best response but in his defense, he was still feeling the residual effects of the panic attack. Pidge gave him a blank look before sighing.

“You know, unlike some people, I actually respect people’s privacy.” Ouch. Now that was a jab. He thought she had gotten over the diary thing but apparently not. “But I’ll help you guys find it, I need a break from this code.”

Hunk startled at the feeling of Lance slinging his arm around his shoulder. “See man! We have three paladins of Voltron on the case, we’ll find it in no time!” Hunk took a deep breath, trying to think positively.

“Yeah… we’ll find it.” Though he wasn’t quite sure.

 

Despite there being three of them, they still came up with no results. Everyone was getting frustrated.

“It couldn’t have just disappeared!” complained Pidge after three hours of searching.

“Is there a way to check the cameras?” asked Lance, who was sitting on the floor.

“Not if it was in Hunk’s room. The residence hall doesn’t have cameras and I looked at the ones closest. The only person up that night was Shiro.”

“So we ask Shiro! Maybe he noticed something,” said Lance. Hunk panicked.

“No, we are not asking Shiro. He’ll use his dad voice and say something like, ‘I’m not mad, just disappointed.’ I can’t handle a disappointed Shiro, man! Not to mention he might make us tell Keith which I really don’t want to do.”

“You’ll have to return it to him if we do find it anyways,” pointed out Pidge. “What do you plan to say then?”

“Oh god.”

“Don’t worry man, if he stabs you we’ll attend your funeral,” said Lance, standing up to pat Hunk’s back. The yellow paladin’s eyes widened.

“Lance!”

 

Eventually, they had to put a pause to the search when Coran called them down for dinner. According to him, he made something very special. Hunk was gagging already. If he found the knife (not if, when, he had to stay positive) he would make something special to heal everyone’s taste buds.

Hunk, Lance, and Pidge were the last ones to arrive and Coran greeted them enthusiastically. Apparently, the altean man had already set out their plates.

Last time they had Coran’s cooking, he was too busy checking on Keith to join them. However, this time he was seated at the table. None of them had the heart to refuse the food when he was right there. Hunk couldn’t help but gag at the first bite.

As he was powering through it, he glanced at the other paladins. Shiro was eating so fast that he wouldn’t be able to taste it. Lance was trying to talk through the pain, keeping up a light-hearted conversation with Coran. Pidge didn’t bother to hide her disgusted expression after each bite, but thankfully the altean wasn’t looking at her enough to notice. Even Allura seemed grossed out proving that this was Coran’s bad cooking, Altean food wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Keith seemed to be doing the best, absentmindedly eating without any visible issues. Although the red paladin was always the one that could handle Coran’s cooking the best. Even Shiro had the occasional cringe.

Though, Hunk had to wonder if Keith was doing okay. He looked exhausted, maybe even worse than yesterday. No one commented on it this time, but he noticed a few concerned glances towards the red paladin. Was this… was this all because of the knife? Was Keith that torn up about it? Was Hunk that awful?

He looked down at his food, suddenly losing his appetite. If anything, Hunk had expected Keith to be angry. Keith was angry, at least he was yesterday. That anger had seemed to fizzle out and it was just sad to see. Hunk’s grip on his spork tightened, he had to find that knife.

 

Thankfully, Lance and Pidge were still willing to help him search despite doing it for hours earlier. This time they split up with the hope of covering more ground. Hunk was amazed by just how big the castle really was. Even after nearly two full days of searching he had really only scratched the surface.

It took a good hour of nonstop looking for Shiro to find him. Hunk stiffened at the sight of the black paladin and tried to act casual.

“Hey Hunk, have you by chance seen Keith’s knife? The one that he usually keeps on his belt. I think he misplaced it and it’s really been bothering him.” Well, it looked like he didn’t have to worry about Shiro finding out since he already knew. Hunk opened and closed his mouth a few times, ready for some excuse but… the expression on Shiro’s face made him pause. The black paladin looked worried, how could Hunk lie to that face?

Looking down at his feet so he wouldn’t have to see that expression morph into disappointment, Hunk decided to be honest. “I uh… I lost it.” He explained to Shiro what happened, admitting that he was trying to be nice but it hadn’t been there when he got up.

“I’ve been looking nonstop since yesterday. Lance and Pidge are also helping me but we haven’t had any luck.” When he was done, he looked up at Shiro, bracing himself for the black paladin’s reaction.

Only his expression hadn’t changed. He still looked just as worried and Hunk began to fiddle with his hands anxiously.

“I’ll help you look. I know you didn’t mean any harm by it, but we do have to discuss asking for things before you take them.” Shiro glanced at him. “I’ll save that lecture for after we find the knife.” Hunk could only nod in response, he did deserve a lecture after all of this to be fair.

 

Hunk and Shiro searched for the knife together, mostly in silence until the yellow paladin spoke up.

“So how did- how did you know it was missing?” He wanted to facepalm after asking. Shiro wasn’t the type of person to miss Keith walking around with the sheath on his belt empty.

“Keith told me,” said Shiro, and Hunk honestly didn’t expect to hear that.

“He did? I mean, I just didn’t think telling people his problems was a thing he did,” said Hunk, remembering their interaction in the kitchen. Keith refused to tell Hunk what he lost despite it obviously upsetting him.

“He has a hard time opening up. If I hadn’t pushed a little he wouldn’t have told me at all.” Hunk stayed silent for a moment, digesting the information.

“You two seem really close,” he finally settles on. Shiro nods at his words.

“I was assigned as his mentor at the Garrison. He had a hard time adjusting to it and lashed out. He’s grown a lot since but there are some things that he still needs to work on.” Shiro gave Hunk a small smile. “I think Voltron is good for him.”

It was then that Hunk had to rethink everything he knew about Keith. At the Garrison, he had often heard Lance complain about how easy it was for the star pilot, how all the teachers loved him and he didn’t have to work as hard as everyone else. However, hearing this from Shiro… it made Keith seem more human. It showed that the red paladin still had things he needed to improve, just like everyone else. Not to mention that, although piloting seemed easy for him, the Garrison, in general, wasn’t.

It brought out a new side to Keith he had never seen before. Hunk swore to himself that after this was over, he would get to know the real Keith.


	5. Chapter 5

In the end, it was Pidge who found the knife. She showed up to the lounge that Hunk and Shiro were searching with Allura and the space mice in tow. Hunk nearly cried when he saw her holding the item.

“The space mice gave it to Allura,” she said, shooting the four creatures a slight glare. “They used the vents to get in and out of your room.”

“Apparently they were fascinated when they saw you cleaning it and gave it to me to help me feel better. They know I like shiny things,” said Allura, sheepishly.

“Were you keeping it?” asked Hunk, unable to help his curiosity. Allura nodded.

“I wasn’t sure what it was. They left it on my nightstand table for me to find. Quite honestly I believed it came from one of the many armories around the castle and didn’t question it until Pidge saw me with it in my room.” Ever the diplomat, she bowed. “I apologize for all the trouble.” She handed the knife to Hunk.

“You should return it to Keith,” said Shiro from behind him. “You have enough time before lights out. It’s best if we don’t keep putting this off.” Hunk nodded, unable to disagree. As he walked out he looked back one more time to see the others giving him encouraging smiles.

 

Hunk stood outside of Keith’s room, trying to build up the nerve to knock. He wasn’t as scared since his talk with Shiro, but it was still nerve-wracking. Keith had every right to get angry at him for this. Hunk knew he would get angry if their positions were switched.

Not wanting to wait any longer, he took a steadying breath and finally knocked on the cool metal of the door. There was a muffled shout of “Hold on!” and a few minutes later Keith opened the door.

“Shiro I don’t need-” he began before realizing that Hunk was not actually Shiro. “Oh, Hunk. Do you need something?” he asked. Keith seemed to suddenly realize Hunk was holding his knife because his eyes widened and he hesitantly reached out before drawing his hand back hurriedly.

“Can we talk in your room?” asked Hunk, afraid that if they were in the hall someone would interrupt.

Keith visibly swallowed before taking a step back and letting Hunk into his room. The yellow paladin’s eyes instantly widened at the sight. What, only a few days ago, had been tidy and uniform was now a disaster. Or as much of a disaster as it could be when there was so little in there, to begin with.

The mattress was off the frame, the blanket was strewn about on the floor, and Keith’s pillow was across the room as if he had thrown it. Not to mention his paladin armor was on the ground along with his pajamas. Hunk had never even seen Keith wear his pajamas and yet there they were.

He snapped out of it when he noticed Keith kept casting his gaze between Hunk and the knife. Oh right. He hurriedly handed it over and noted how Keith hesitantly accepted it.

“How did you find it?”

“Uh, it was actually Pidge that found it but- I was the one that took it.” After the admission, Hunk couldn’t help but fiddle with his hands anxiously. “After you got that concussion I felt… really bad because it was kind of my fault you got distracted? So I thought- I thought I could make it up to you by cleaning your knife. I didn’t know it was so important to you but even then it wasn’t right to take it. I’m really sorry. I really wanted to return it as soon as possible but the mice had taken it and gave it to Allura and-”

“Allura had it?” Keith seemed alarmed at this and Hunk hesitantly nodded.

“They gave it to her to try and cheer her up, she didn’t know it was yours. But I took it so it was best I returned it to you.” Keith didn’t seem comforted by this fact as he looked down at the knife. Eventually, he sighed and put it in the sheath on his belt.

“Thanks for returning it at least. I-I get you were trying to be nice but don’t do it again,” he said, crossing his arms. Hunk was a little surprised by the tame reaction.

“Not gonna lie man, I thought you’d be a lot angrier.” A part of him still expected to get stabbed.

“I am angry,” he said honestly, narrowing his eyes. “But like I said, I get you were trying to be nice.” Well, at least he was understanding?

“That’s totally fair. I did kind of take your most prized possession which, I have got to ask where you got it from. I’ve never seen anything like it and the sigil was- I can’t place it.” Maybe asking questions wasn’t the best idea since Keith only seemed to tense.

“You saw the sigil?” He looked uneasy and Hunk looked down at his hands ashamed.

“Y-yeah I replaced the bandages. I probably should have guessed you were hiding it, sorry.” Keith only sighed and sat down on the bed frame, placing his head in his hands. He stayed like that for awhile, long enough that Hunk contemplated leaving.

“It was my mom’s, that’s all I know.” Oh, so it was an heirloom. He bit back the questions he wanted to ask and they sat in silence as he tried to think of a response.

“Uh, thanks for not stabbing me,” he tries to joke, giving a rather awkward smile. Keith apparently didn’t get it as he gave a confused look.

“Why would I- why would I stab you?”

“I was joking because of the whole… lone wolf thing you have going on. Not the best timing I’ll admit.” Keith frowned at the words “lone wolf.” He looked at his lap and crossed his arms.

“Why does everyone always assume I like to be alone?” he said quietly. Hunk almost didn’t hear him. Suddenly Keith’s crossed arms seemed a lot more like he was hugging himself than he was trying to be cool. Hunk hesitantly set his hand on Keith’s shoulder and kept it there when the red paladin didn’t move away from it.

“I guess we just… don’t know you enough. I mean we only just got to space and besides training, we don’t see you a whole lot. If… if you ever want to hang out with us you can.” He wondered if Keith just didn’t know he could do that. “We’re a team, practically family. You don’t have to close yourself off from us. Unless you need some you-time which is understandable, Pidge is also an introvert but I know she gets lonely sometimes.”

During his talk, Keith had looked up at him. His eyes seemed shiny and he couldn’t seem to form the right response. Hunk only hesitated for a moment before wrapping the red paladin in a hug. The yellow paladin couldn’t help but shed a few tears. He was so wrong about Keith.

Eventually, they separated and Hunk stood back up.

“Thank you,” said Keith and Hunk wasn’t sure if he meant the knife or the hug. Either way, Hunk smiled at him.

“I’ll let you sleep. See you at breakfast?”

“Yeah, see you,” said Keith, returning his smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe i finished it, i never finish.... amazing...
> 
> also i kinda want to do a sequel and a bonus keith pov. theres a few scenes in this one that would make a lot more sense 
> 
> also, if you have the time, PLEASE consider commenting. like even if its short it really helps validate me lmao


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